


Merciful Thing

by anactoria



Category: Watchmen (2009)
Genre: Blindfolds, Bondage, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Sub Adrian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-27
Updated: 2012-02-27
Packaged: 2017-10-31 20:09:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/347906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anactoria/pseuds/anactoria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adrian feels responsible for everything. Dan tries to help him let go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Merciful Thing

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on LJ in 2009. Thanks to muse_of_graphia for the beta.

Dan's curled into an armchair in the penthouse, half-reading a book he's plucked off one of Adrian's shelves, when the elevator pings. 

The evening is blue and dimming. It's late.

That's the first bad sign.

"Hey," Dan says, glancing up, as the doors swish open. But Adrian doesn't answer or come to sit down, or give any sign that he's heard, just walks straight through into the bedroom, footsteps quick with nervous energy.

That's the second.

Dan tosses the book down and follows him through, a hot thread of worry creeping up from his gut and catching in his throat.

Two paces from the window, Adrian has stopped and is standing still as something carved in stone, gazing out. Dan circles round to look at him head-on. He'd be a beautiful sight, if only there was any peace there, but Dan instantly notices the tension in the lines of Adrian's body and the tiny creases round his eyes, the shadowed, distracted expression that means he's overwhelmed by stress and sorrow and self-reproach, sinking under the weight of it.

"Adrian." 

Seconds pass like minutes before Adrian blinks and says, "Dan," as though he's somewhere on the other side of a thick fog and Dan's voice has only just reached him.

"Bad day?" Dan asks.

"I have had better." The words should be wry but they fall short, uninflected.

"Have you had dinner? I already did, but we can order something in."

Adrian smiles. "No; thank you. I ate earlier."

Which probably means a sandwich five hours ago, but that isn't Dan's most pressing concern right now. Because Adrian's smile is the polite, cordial one that he uses in meetings and on TV and that doesn't mean a thing, and he's still looking past Dan, out of the window, somewhere horizon-distant.

And Dan knows that that means Adrian still isn't really here, in the room, with him. He's thinking about the city, and the world beyond it, and everything that's left to be done, and how every stone and every life in it is _his_ responsibility, because his guilt won't be assuaged until the world is made new and healed and right, every bit of it, and perhaps not even then.

It's almost stupid and hopeless enough to make Dan angry, except that he got over that a long time ago, and he knows it doesn't achieve anything, anyway. The only thing that works when Adrian's like this is for him to give up control, stop thinking like this -- which usually means stopping thinking at all -- and just let himself be Dan's to take care of for a little while. For that to happen, Dan needs to be gentle.

Besides, Adrian doesn't seem ready to relax just yet, with the thoughts still racing and whirring behind his eyes. Dan's not exactly stupid himself, and even he gets dizzy just thinking about it, how Adrian can manage to worry about the whole world and its problems at once, how his mind can even process it all. 

Genius isn't always a blessing. Living with Adrian makes that abundantly clear.

Dan reaches out and touches Adrian, just gently, a hand on his shoulder and then his arm, getting a little piece of his attention. "Adrian?" he tries, softly. "Are you going to talk to me, or am I gonna have to drag it out of you?"

He already knows what's wrong, of course -- whatever the day's details, the theme remains the same -- but what's really important is getting Adrian to open up and connect with him, to just focus on one person and not the entire world.

Another faint little smile. "Nothing you should worry about," Adrian says. "It isn't your responsibility, Dan."

"It is if I let it be," Dan tells him, taking his hand and squeezing it. (Because what Adrian really means is, ' _I'm_ not your responsibility.' He's offering Dan the chance to get out, just end the conversation and leave him to his guilt, and it near-kills Dan that Adrian still isn't sure of his affection, still feels like he has no right to comfort.) "I _want_ to know what's on your mind. What you need."

At the words Adrian's eyes flicker bed-wards, just this tiny, involuntary glance that Dan would think he'd imagined if he didn't know better. But the emotionless smile stays in place. "I'm fine," he insists.

"Adrian. Stop it. You don't have to pretend. Not with me."

Of course he isn't _fine_. Adrian's never fine, he's never _going_ to be fine unless they wake up one morning and find the world has turned perfect overnight. And Dan's gotten used to that. He's accepted it, as much as he'll ever be able to, and he doesn't aim for fine. He just tries to make Adrian feel a little better, connected and cared-for, able to face being human again.

The smile fades off Adrian's face, and he looks down, eyes falling into shadow. But that's okay, it's progress, it means he's actually hearing what Dan's saying now. 

"I'm sorry," he offers, quietly. "I don't like to worry you unnecessarily. That's all." Adrian's the only person Dan knows who can manage to feel guilty about feeling guilty. "It's just that--"

He breaks off.

"What?" Dan asks, but there's no reply, and he's sure that's because there aren't words to accommodate what Adrian's worrying about right now, because it's _everything_.

Dan swallows a sigh, squeezes Adrian's hand again and lets go just long enough to close the curtains, and flick on the lamp in the corner of the room. Then he's back by Adrian's side, taking his arm and tugging him over to sit on the edge of the bed.

As the cityscape is shut off, Adrian's expression starts to clear, and he meets Dan's eyes properly for the first time this evening. Good: that means his mind is starting to disentangle itself from the threads of stress and concern it's been wrapped up with all day.

Good still doesn't mean okay, though. He still looks unhappy, and after a moment, he murmurs, "You don't _have_ to do this, you know, Dan. You don't have to listen to me."

In this mood, Adrian thinks of his trust as a burden, not a gift, and knowing the reasons why doesn't mean it breaks Dan's heart any less. 

He takes both Adrian's hands, raises one of them to his lips, and kisses it. Adrian's eyes widen minutely at the breath-light touch.

"And _you_ don't have to keep telling me that," Dan says. "Talk to me." Seconds of silence. He racks his brain. "I know the disarmament process isn't going as smoothly as everyone hoped. That what's on your mind?"

"There... has been some tension within the government. Of course, I'm doing all I can to put pressure on the administration, but-- well, it's stressful."

"They'll come round. Hell, most of the country shares your viewpoint by now. And besides, when was the last time you lost an argument?"

"Last Thursday, if memory serves."

"With someone _other_ than me."

One corner of Adrian's mouth twitches with amusement, but there is still something else humming under the surface, visible in the severity of his posture and the way his left thumb is tapping absently against Dan's palm.

"That's not everything, though, is it?" Dan says.

"Am I that easy to read?" Adrian's voice is deliberately light, but Dan is still looking into his eyes and they are pained.

"Only because I know you." Dan shuffles up on the bed so he's sitting behind Adrian, and wraps his arms around him. He waits.

After a couple of seconds, Adrian relaxes infinitesimally, leaning back against him. "Have you looked at the _Post_ today?"

"Yeah." Dan frowns. "Why?"

"There's an item on page five. The Murray case."

"The murders in New Jersey?" Dan remembers skimming the piece, briefly, the headline having snagged his gaze as he scanned the page. The guy had snapped and shot two people at a wedding, before turning the gun on himself. "Yeah, I saw that. What about it?"

"The report did leave out one salient fact. Murray's fiancee died in 1985. She was in New York when the attacks hit. He was on the phone to her at the time."

Dan winces, and lets out a sigh. In the grand scale if things this is a pretty small event, but he can see why it's getting to Adrian. It's a reminder that what he did to bring about peace has caused violence, too, that it has happened now, it is out in the world and he can't control its consequences after the fact, however much he feels like he should be able to. 

"Adrian," he says. "Plenty of people lost loved ones in '85. And most of them don't walk around committing murder. People crack for all kinds of reasons, and you can't know what was going on inside this guy's head, or why he did it. Perhaps he would've killed those people anyway. Perhaps it has nothing to do with what you did." Plain, dull commonsense. Dan knows it doesn't change the fundamentals -- of this case, or the bigger picture -- but that isn't really the point. He's just trying to bring Adrian back into the real world, remind him that he's just a human, that he _can't_ make everything right, that thinking otherwise is pointless self-torture.

"Or everything." Adrian's voice is sad and quiet, but some of the strain has gone out of him now. There's almost a note of relief there, maybe just at having let his thoughts out.

"You can't take the blame for everything." Dan presses a small kiss to the back of Adrian's shoulder. "You can't control everything -- which I'm glad of, quite frankly -- and in any case, there's nothing you can do about it now. Let it go."

"I--"

" _Let it go_."

A long moment passes, then another one. Then Adrian turns his head, just a fraction, and says, "I _may_ need a little help with that."

His voice and his smile are fragile, but he sounds ten times more present and alive than he did when he walked in. Dan's insides flood with relief.

He keeps his tone deliberately light and casual, though. "Help? Don't know what you mean."

"Who's pretending now?" Adrian's words are tease with an undercurrent of tremor, all the need that he isn't expressing out loud visible in his half-closed eyes and the way he is sinking, _dissolving_ , back into Dan's arms. His hands tremble minutely.

Dan smiles, reaching up to un-knot Adrian's tie with quick fingers, and presses another soft kiss to the skin that's exposed when his collar comes undone. Then he pauses, gauging Adrian's reaction. He doesn't say anything, or stand up and turn away in guilt, so Dan follows up with a nip -- just a gentle one, he doesn't want to _hurt_ Adrian -- and Adrian makes this frustrated little sound in the back of his throat that he bites off straight away. Dan pulls away, satisfied, deciding that he can't bear to tease any more tonight.

"Get undressed," he says.

Adrian smiles slightly at him and does as he's told, while Dan reaches for the unassuming storage box that's kept underneath the bed.

(The first time he found this stuff, scrabbling on the floor for his glasses, he was-- well, not surprised, exactly, but kind of puzzled. Because he'd always thought you'd have to really trust somebody to get into this sort of thing with them, and he'd never even known Adrian really _date_ anyone before him, let alone form a lasting attachment. But it wasn't long before he realized that trust had mostly been a foreign concept to Adrian then, anyway, and that Adrian pretty much accepted anything that might go wrong as deserved.)

(And he knows something must have gone wrong, sometime, because among the scars on Adrian's skin are a few that are clearly not from crimefighting. Dan will never ask, though, unless Adrian wants to tell, because he doesn't think he could stand to hear Adrian pretend that whatever happened was okay. Or perhaps he really thought it _was_ okay, perhaps he allowed it to happen -- and that seems more likely, and somehow worse.)

Dan comes up with a length of soft rope and a rectangle of black cloth, and then glances behind him. Adrian has collapsed back onto the bed and he's just lying there, stripped bare and shining pale gold against the purple sheets, regarding Dan through lowered lashes with expectant curiosity. 

For a second, Dan just lets himself look. Even now the thought that this man is _his_ , loves him and trusts him so completely, has the power to take his breath away. Like this Adrian might be the most beautiful, the most precious thing in the world, all the planes and angles of him fitted together with delicate precision, and the thought that he ever believed he deserved pain -- that at times he still does -- makes Dan so angry he gets dizzy with it.

But he pulls his thoughts up from that path, and just holds the blindfold up with a questioning look. 

A small smile curves Adrian's lips, and he nods but doesn't move, just waits for Dan's hands to find him and guide him up into a sitting position, and for the strip of fabric to come to rest over his eyes. 

As it settles, Adrian breathes in deeply and stills, and Dan's arms are around him right away, hugging him close through the moments it takes him to acclimatize to it, to give himself permission to give himself up. Dan just holds him, reassuring him with whispers and little touches, fingers tracing the ridges of his spine and the sharp jut of a hipbone, until Adrian's breath escapes him in a small, pleased sigh.

"Better?" Dan asks.

"Much."

Better. Not enough, though. Adrian's voice still has a tightness and a strain in it, and the involuntary twitch of his fingers betrays that he's still not quite relaxed.

"Lie back," Dan instructs, and he reaches for the rope, letting the end of it trail across Adrian's belly so that he shivers.

He guides Adrian's arms back, over his head, presses a kiss to the inside of each wrist before tying them, wrapping the rope around several times to spread the pressure and checking with a finger for tightness.

"Comfortable?" he asks, and Adrian nods in reply. His breath is coming more quickly, not quite controlled, and he's hard now, and when Dan pulls away to strip off his own clothes Adrian whispers his name with a note of desperation.

"I'm here," Dan reassures him, immediately, and brushes Adrian's hip with a hand. He hates letting go of Adrian when he's tied up, hates breaking contact, because the whole point is for Adrian to know that he can abdicate responsibility for a little while, that there's someone here to take care of him.

So as soon as his clothes are abandoned on the floor he kneels on the bed, nudging Adrian's legs apart and pressing him into the mattress, just touching as much of him as possible. Adrian's mouth opens under his, soft and accepting -- and _fuck_ , they haven't even kissed yet today, not properly, not like this, and that seems like such a heinous omission. 

Dan almost thinks that he could just stay like this, doing this, forever, except that then Adrian gives this helpless little moan and his hips buck up impatiently. Dan slides a hand beneath him, smoothing it across his lower back and the curve of his ass, lets his fingers trail up the inside of Adrian's thigh and leaves his hand there, barely-touching, just to reassure, as he reaches for the little tube on the nightstand.

He smears lube on his fingers, feels Adrian's body tense and then relax again as he slides one in. He twists it, slowly, and Adrian gives this undignified little whine and presses up against his hand, wanting. 

"Sh, sh, wait," Dan whispers, and he stills Adrian's hips with a gentling hand, waits until he's stopped pushing, stopped demanding, before moving again. He aims for 'agonizingly slow,' and, judging by the way Adrian bites his lip against a moan or a plea, he's doing pretty well. 

He adds another finger, crooks them forward and Adrian's toes curl and he actually _whimpers_ , all bright and flushed with need. Dan's pretty sure he's not worrying now, not thinking about anything other than what they're doing. 

The thought makes him smile. Once Adrian's over the uncertainty and the guilt at allowing himself pleasure, Dan's pretty good at taking his mind off his worries. That's one thing he knows for sure. 

Dan hears his name again as he slips his fingers out and the word is a cracked half-sob, bereft as much as it is frustrated. He brushes the flat of Adrian's stomach to soothe him and then circles his cock with a hand, just briefly, just enough to make him twitch and gasp, before slicking himself up and settling back between Adrian's thighs.

Adrian's trembling. 

"You okay?" Dan whispers, fitting a palm against Adrian's hip, waiting for him to nod and form a 'yes' with his lips before pressing inside. Just a little; enough to frustrate, not to fulfill. He rocks back, nudges in again.

"Dan..." Adrian groans.

"Something wrong?" Dan just about manages to keep his voice steady, gently teasing. "I can stop if you want me to."

"No. No. _Fuck_. Oh..."

So he just carries on until Adrian can't form words any more, he's just making these, tiny, needful, begging little noises that make Dan think he's going to come there and then. Because he's never going to get over being able to do this to Adrian, _him_ of all people, it just doesn't seem real, it amazes him every time.

He doesn't want this to be over too soon, though. He stills, stops moving, and Adrian gasps in protest, mouth silently open, struggling to shape something that might be 'please,' bound hands twitching, grasping.

Dan just stays there, motionless, for as long as he can stand it, and then he pulls out and sinks back into Adrian, all the way this time. He wraps a hand around Adrian's cock and pulls, once, twice, and that's all it takes. Adrian tightens round him and jerks in his hand and spills on a choked-back cry, fingers twining round each other, desperate to clutch at something.

He goes limp, after a moment, somewhere between relaxed and shaky, a small, unselfconscious, _real_ smile curving his lips. But he still pushes his hips back up when Dan presses deep into him, marking each thrust with an appreciative little moan until Dan feels his whole body tighten and release and comes still thinking about Adrian's fingers.

Dan doesn't pull away immediately, afterwards. He leans down, weight on his forearms, covering Adrian's body with his own, presses kisses to Adrian's neck and his temples and his eyelids through the blindfold until he's stopped trembling.

He kisses Adrian's hands, too, once he's untied them, rubbing them between his own to make sure the feeling's back, then tugs the blanket over Adrian and crawls under it to lie beside him, to feel his heartbeat and his breathing slow. Then he pulls it up over both their heads, making a dim little cave so Adrian can get used to the light again. He unfastens the blindfold.

Adrian's eyes shine up at him, softly. 

"Good to have you back," Dan says.

Adrian reaches up to cup the side of his face. "Thank you," he says, gently. "I know I'm not always easy."

And Dan wants to tell him that that doesn't matter, that love isn't about easy, it means being there for the sad stuff and the difficult stuff, too, that he _wants_ to be there, that he'll give Adrian whatever he needs, for as long as he needs it. But the moment -- and Adrian's peace of mind, probably -- is so fragile he's scared too much seriousness would shatter it.

So instead he just raises an eyebrow, half-smiling, and says, "I'm not sure I can agree with you there."

Adrian sniffs and tries to look offended, but he's smiling too. Happy, for now. 

Not _okay_ , not _fine_ , but happy. 

And it's enough. It's all they have.


End file.
